Student Story: Michelle Searle in Tanzania

(submitted by Michelle)

Michelle Searle, in her third year of Ph. D. at the Faculty of Education, Queen’s University travelled to Tanzania for five weeks to conduct research about a project she has been involved with for the past 5 years. Each year since its inception, a group of pre-service teacher candidates has spent approximately six months engaged in planning the project, which culminates with their three-week teaching placement at two schools in Butiama, Tanzania.

As of March 2011, 48 pre-service educators will have learned about educational goals at this school in Tanzania, raised awareness and approximately $50,000 in funds prior to departure for three weeks of volunteering at the schools. Their efforts over this time have included literacy initiatives, creative arts projects as well as the procurement of physical resources such as desks and windows, cleaning the school and painting blackboards. Currently, 86 children who might not have otherwise attended school are beneficiaries of multi-year scholarships established through the ‘Tanzania Project’. The project is moving into a new phase as Queen’s Alumni return to the project site during their summer vacations to once again volunteer. One past teacher candidate volunteer stated, “This project impacted my life as it showed me the true value of education and how it can change the life of a child in so many positive ways. I re-evaluated my own life”.  

The ‘Tanzania Project’ and complementary research component were designed to investigate international practicum experiences and the project of as a whole because of the belief that these offer valuable opportunities that promote teaching and learning. International experiences can be a catalyst for understanding the self and other, a sensory experience that instructs in ways that no textbook can – by allowing you to dwell in conditions that enable embodied ways of knowing through living the experience. Beyond the sensory experiences, Stachowski & Sparks (2007) identified that research about international teaching experiences have been well documented; Alfaro (2008) takes this further when citing multiple studies that have recognized the positive effects for students who participate in these experiences (Kissock, 1997; Cushner & Mahon, 2002; Quezada, 2005; Quezada & Alfaro, 2009; Stachowski & Brantmeier, 2002).

Michelle’s research builds on these ideas by facilitating a conversation that explores international teaching experiences from a slightly different approach, by looking through the lens of an affiliated program. In this case, an affiliated program is one that is associated with a course within a Faculty of Education but is not directly or exclusively connected to the students in that course or university. In fact, the impetus and success of the program is largely because of a network of connections fostered and nurtured within, across and outside of our faculty. This affiliated program is known as the ‘Tanzania Project’ at the Faculty of Education, Queen’s University.

The purpose of the ‘Tanzania Project’ is to promote and develop a reciprocal partnership that offers students an international teaching experience, while also contributing and supporting educational initiatives in Tanzania.

Michelle’s research contributes to an understanding of this project from multiple perspectives, Queen’s teacher candidates (past and present), local Tanzanian school administrators and teachers involved in the project, Tanzanian secondary school students and the project host in Tanzania. If you would like to learn more about the project or Michelle’s research, please contact her at  michellesearle@yahoo.com.